LABOR'S GAME (2015)

This art book carries out, thanks also to the support of Copernico, the idea of putting together all the projects concerning work that I’ve been developing through the years.

In SCALA 1:18 (2008) my research focuses on the factory environment; ANYTHING ELSE (2011) examines craftsmanship as a place of labour, of men’s manual ability, of revenge on the alienation caused by the factory; finally, LABOR: WHAT IS IT (2012), a project based on a series of interviews recorded outside some Job Centres* in London, highlights the consequences, expressed as a state of depression, that concern unemployed people.

In the art book the dance schemes of the two dancers in the performances SCALA 1:18 and ANYTHING ELSE (concerning the factory and the craftsmanship) are punched on two middle papers that are bound to make two envelopes whose opening is an upside-down L.
These envelopes are made to contain some papers with the text (in English) of the interviews recorded outside some Job Center in London for
LABOR: WHAT IS IT. The texts, shown through the schemes that are cut in the paper, tell of the depression the unemployed suffer from and reveal these people’s dissociation from the routine of an everyday job. Work defines an order, a life scheme within reality. Being outside those schemes defined by work causes to lose rights and creates confusion in one’s life.

* A Job Center is a place where one can look for a job but especially where unemployed can get benefits. To get these benefits, those who are looking for a job must follow some very strict rules: they have to show their actual effort in finding a job, filling in a specific booklet, they have to sign every two weeks, they have to undergo a series of interviews, and so on.

One hundred and fifty unique handmade art books; made in 1/150 edition in December 2015; numbered, signed and certified by the artist. Each one of the art books has an original drawing and six pages of text interacting with the punched pages of the book. White thread binding.

COPERNICO COLLECTION (2015)
Collezione Copernico (40 Collectors Association, Trento, Italy) annually asks an artist to produce a multiple, this year
LABOR’S GAME supported the project with the purchase of 40 copies.